In U.S. Pat. No. 6,000,897 of Desjarlais issued Dec. 14th, 1999 is disclosed a machine for inserting a plastic coil into aligned holes at the edge of a book for binding of the book.
This machine which forms the basis of the present invention has achieved considerable commercial success and has operated successfully in the insertion of plastic coils automatically.
However the machine has received some criticism based upon the difficulties of adjusting the machine for initial set-up to accommodate a particular size of book. Printing in general is requiring machines to produce shorter runs of particular products so that customers can keep down levels of inventory and can customise particular books. Thus the machine is required more frequently to be set-up for different dimensions of book including particularly the thickness of the book.
It will be appreciated that the dimensions of the coil are dependant upon the thickness of the book so that a particular coil is selected to match the thickness and that coil thus has a predetermined radius of curvature thus requiring the edge of the book to be set-up at the required curvature to receive the coil as it is rotated about its axis. However coils are manufactured using different diameter of filament so that it is not possible to adjust the machine by inputting a particular coil dimension by a numerical value.
Yet further the change in thickness of the book requires a different location for the clamping system in its clamped position in view of the required curvature of the book at the position in which it is located to receive the coil.
Yet further different coils having a different pitch length are required in some circumstances depending upon the spacing of the holes in the book which is selected by the customer.
All of these elements must therefore be set in the machine before a new batch of books can be bound using the required settings on the machine and the required coil. While settings on the existing machine could be carried out without significant difficulty, it is highly desirable to provide an improved machine in which the settings can be effected with even less difficulty.